Coming Soon
Posted on Wed Jan 4th, 2023 @ 6:21pm by Lieutenant Commander Nolan Marc & Latchkey Kid Holographic Program Mk I & Taran Willeg
Edited on on Wed Jan 4th, 2023 @ 9:21pm
Mission:
R&R: The Reprieve
Timeline: Simultaneous with "Station, Sweet Station"
Tags: nolan
2574 words - 5.1 OF Standard Post Measure
The windows along the outermost edge of the saucer section had one area along the port side that offered a view out into space.
Several people mulled around, starting out at the new space station, but the most unique of those gathered were the two boys. Huddled over a padd, the pair seemed to be planning their summer vacation.
Or, at least, as close as one could get on a starship with a regulated, artificial atmosphere. And a total lack of seasons. Or even a standard by which to measure seasonal changes in time.
Really, it was just shore leave. But it was hard to think of it in terms of shore leave when one them was literally ten and regularly attended school.
Some kids had snow days -- those kids probably didn’t live on Andoria -- and other kids, like on Vesta, had dimensional crisis or converging multiverse days, but whatever the cause to make up school later, there was no denying that a much deserved break was definitely in order.
The Klingon-looking boy made a happy sound, bouncing excitedly as he pressed the padd into the human-looking boy’s hands and gushed, “It says that there’s an arboretum with interactive xenozoology holograms!”
The blond haired Only just blinked. “Ehhhhh!?” he uttered, in a decidedly non-inside voice. Sure enough, as his eyes traced the path laid out for him by Taran’s finger, there was, indeed, an advertisement detailing a safari-like adventure with animals from across the Alpha, Beta, and even the Delta Quadrants.“
Dressing up the arboretum with an interactive Safari hologram program. Why hadn’t he thought of that?
Or, at the very least, Jack.
“Sugoi ne,” the boy uttered, sharing his friends impression and eagerness to steal the idea -- that is, enjoy the exhibit aboard the station.
Then Nolan frowned. “...e to ne...,” the boy murmured in his usual Okinawan dialect. As he read a little further, he tilted the screen so that Taran could read it as he pointed to another section and remarked, “I don’t think it’s ready yet. It says coming soon.”
“WHAAAAAAAAAT”, Taran cried, prompting stares from the up and down the corridor.
Much sadness. Many disappoint.
“Oh,” the Klingon-looking Betazoid lamented, as though conceding. His shoulders slumped forward as he squeezed in close to Nolan to take another look at the padd. “Well, there’s, like... a, like, pre... uh, promenade, right?”
Nolan frowned as he thumbed through the station directory that had been passed around the ship for shore leave planning. “Coming soon,” the Only stated, reading off the padd.
“A replimat?”
Nolan swiped right. Then swiped left twice, doubling back to an earlier section of the directory. “Coming soon.”
“Eh!?” the space-born hybrid uttered, looking at Nolan with a look that mixed surprise and disgust. No repliment, what were they eating over there? Federation rations?
Banana beef. Still not a fan.
“Toy store?” Taran asked, throwing his arms up, grasping for metaphorical straws.
“Coming soon,” Nolan repeated.
The dark-skinned boy gave a huff. Then, changed tactics as he asked, instead, “Well, is there anything that doesn’t say coming soon?”
“Hmmm. Nanisore...” Nolan murmured, as he started swiping right, left, up, and down on the directory. Finally, he seemed to land on a page that didn’t bear the cursed words. “Looks like there’s a House of Lojmlt in the lower auxiliary craft support section,” the boy reported, though he started to do a little more digging.
No sense getting hopes up.
“That’s pretty far down in the engineering section,” the Only realized, cross-referencing the station schematic. “Ugh. Seedy neighborhood. Probably swing shift security officers and engineers either going on duty or just getting off. And if they’re still setting up the station, probably double shifts.”
He recalled his days on Deep Space Five.
He didn’t miss his days on Deep Space Five, just recalled them.
“What’s a House of Lojmlt?” Taran asked innocently.
“Waffle House!” Nolan chimed in reply, the phrase bringing an instant smile to his face. Though, he paused for a moment to reflect, “Which also fits the seedy neighborhood.”
“What’s a Waffle House?”
“It’s a house. Only with waffles,” the Only supplied in answer. Then he thought about what he said, because he generally did his best thinking about what he was saying after he’d said it. “Well, not really a house. But its a restaurant. With waffles. And some other stuff probably.”
Hash browns. Coffee. And, uh...
...what else did a Waffle Ho... er, House of Lojmlt have?
“Oh!” Nolan uttered, as something came to mind. “And the occasional thrown chair, which is why I think the Klingons bought the franchise.”
“Wait,” Taran uttered, taking a step back as he threw up his hands. “So its a Klingon thing?”
The skepticism was real.
Maybe it was having been cooped up in the ship for months. Or maybe it had been the interdimensional shoot out with Dominion shock troops and Marines. Or maybe Nolan was just being oblivious, or some combination of the three, but the Only gave a huff of his own with a characteristic head roll as he proclaimed, “Its the only thing that’s open and its somewhere not on this ship!”
Seriously, he’d crash a Gorn wedding at this point just to look at something that wasn’t a bulkhead.
Taran shook his head firmly. “Uh uh.”
Nolan rolled his eyes. “You can’t hide from Klingons forever!” the Only quipped, letting his mouth run as he blurted out, “You see one every time you look in a mirror.”
Again, after he’d said it, he thought about it.
And thought, I probably shouldn’t have said that.
=============
“And that’s when he hit you?”
The disheveled blond-haired Only sat on the dining table in his quarters. A very annoying Emergency Medical Holographic Program probing at his face. The area around Nolan’s left eye was already starting to take on the characteristic color of a black eye.
“Yes,” Nolan repeated, for the second time.
The hologram stood back, comparing the two accounts for inconsistencies that would indicate that Nolan was lying, but his programming seemed to indicate that Nolan was being truthful. Finally, the hologram admitted, “I should be disappointed, but I think I’m impressed.”
The Only shoot the balding image a dark glare, before wincing as his face was poked and prodded by the medical demon. “Ughhh,” Nolan sighed. “It’s fine. Whatever.”
Crossing his arms, the boy tried to jerk his head away as he pouted, only to have the EMH tilt it back as the hologram continued working on reducing the swelling.
"I’ll just go over there and check out the station myself,” Nolan muttered.
Once he’d finally finished being tortured and interrogated by the hologram, the boy hopped down from the table.
Picking up the shore leave directions again, Nolan weaved a path that traveled past furniture, action figures, and assorted plastic objects on the floor before exiting into the hallways, all while being absorbed into the padd in his hands.
Disembarking the Vesta, it may have just been his imagination, but the ship’s security officer seemed to breathe a sigh of relief at the sight of Nolan walking off the ship.
At the end of the gangway that formed the bridge between the station and the docked ship, another security officer was present. This one being station security.
Lowering the padd down, Nolan looked up as he heard, “Welcome to Es...”
That was it.
Welcome to Es.
The boy just blinked.
The security officer just blinked back.
Tilting his head to one side, Nolan uttered, “Es... quimalt Station?”
Recovering from his shock, the station security officer cleared his throat. Then, smoothing the front of his uniform, announced, “We’re not ready for civilian visitors yet.”
Nolan blinked a second time.
Civilian...
...visitors.
The boy’s head tilted over to the other side, as he tried to process this.
“You’ll have to return to the ship. When you return, your parents will need to accompany you aboard the station.”
“Seriously?” the boy uttered flatly, his head going back in a mixture of disgust and confusion.
Stepping forward, as though prepared to shoo the boy back up the gangplank, the officer continued, “Yes. Starfleet regulations require children under the age of...”
“Bruh.”
Nolan didn’t move, instead he turned his head up toward the security officer.
He was standing there in uniform and getting addressed as a...
Drawing in a deep breath through his nose, the boy let it go in a slow sigh. This was fine. Hundreds of alien species. A lot that looked human. Confusion and misunderstanding was understandable.
“My name is Lieutenant Commander Nolan Marc,” the boy supplied, starting over as he explained, “I’m the Chief Science Officer of the Vesta and, spoiler alert, I’m not human.”
Now it was the security officer’s turn to blink a second time, as the man seemed to be having some difficulty processing this.
Nolan could relate to that.
“I am adorable, however,” the boy added, giving the security officer -- who was only doing his job -- a smile as he did.
Well, half a smile.
A third of a smile maybe.
He’d just gotten punched in the face by his best friend, dealt with an interdimensional crisis, been involved in a shootout with Dominion shock troops, AND JUST WANTED ONE HOUR OFF THE GOD DAMN SHIP!
A third of a smile was the most anybody was getting out of him right now.
“Huh,” the security officer remarked, stepping back to his terminal and pulling up Nolan’s access file. When the man looked up again, he admitted, “I’ve never encountered a species like yours before.”
There. Misunderstanding resolved.
Nolan drew in another deep breath.
“Only,” the security officer read aloud, the confusion clear in his voice as he looked at Nolan to ask, “Only what?”
“Wakaranai,” the boy answered with a shrug and a bemused tone. Waving goodbye, Nolan started into the station as he added, “If you figure it out, let me know.”
Nolan stopped in mid-stride, walking several steps backward as he added, “Oh, and there’s one other aboard the Vesta as well.”
Jack had been having even more of a case of the Mondays than Nolan had been this mission. Definitely didn’t need to be dealing with this if he got sprung from Doctor Sorenson’s Alcatraz.
That revelation just seemed to make the security officer more confused. “So you’re not the only Only?”
Nodding, the smile on Nolan’s face might have gone up to a half-smile. “We’re the only Onlies on the ship,” he remarked.
He started back on his way, when instead he doubled back again. “And there’s a S’ti’ach.”
The security officer just gave him a blank-looking expression.
“Teddy bear with blue fur and six limbs,” Nolan supplied, before starting off for the third -- and hopefully, final -- time.
Now, this? This was what Starfleet was all about. Not only was Nolan boldly going, but he was being educational at the same time!
At long last, the end of the gallant quest, wherein BRAVE SIR NOLAN had done battle with the Beast of Ignorance at yon Gates of Esquimalt, and did thus enter into the valley of the shadow of...
...cargo containers?
That was it. Modular Federation construction crates and cargo containers. As far as the eyes could see. Some area of the station weren’t even fully installed yet. Just empty sections waiting for a purpose.
That was anticlimactic to say the least.
Still, the boy continued on. Even if it was boring scenery, at least it was something different.
That was until a very stoppable object encountered an unmovable pair of legs.
Stumbling back, the boy just blinked. “Nani?”
That hadn’t been an accident, this dude had just stepped into his path. And, as soon as Nolan’s eyes landed on mustard gold coloring, he was already feeling his shoulders slump in anticipation of what was about to happen.
“The station’s not equipped for civilian guests yet,” the man remarked, an Irish brogue coloring his words, as he explained, “You’ll have to return to your ship.”
Nolan’s head rolled back. “Uggghhhhhhh,” the boy uttered in frustration.
“I can wait here for your parents to come get you if you li...”
“Scan me,” Nolan stated flatly.
Nope. Not doing all that again. They were jumping straight to the point this time.
The burly figure seemed taken aback by the blunt response. “Beg your pardon?”
“My combadge,” Nolan stated, pointing to the one on his chest -- the chest adorned in a Starfleet uniform -- as he again repeated the request. “Scan my combadge.”
Pulling the tricorder from out of its holster on his hip, the man bent forward slightly as he let the device take the biometric reading and then straightened back up as he read the result. “Lieutenant Commander...” the man read aloud, before he paused.
Then he blurted out, “This bloody can’t be right.”
Yes. Aside from the fact that he was wearing a Starfleet uniform, with a combadge that corresponded to the file for a current Starfleet officer, and he was wearing two solid and one hollow pip, clearly he was not a lieutenant commander.
“Abadonkeyo,” the boy uttered quietly, slipping back into his Okinawa dialect.
“What?” the man asked, looking down at the boy.
“Zenzen nandemonai,” the boy answered, in more standard Japanese, before he gestured and asked, “May I...?”
The man looked at the boy, then at his tricorder, then stepped aside. “Oh, right, sir.”
Nolan let out another sigh. Shoulders slumped forward, he had gone no more than three steps when he heard “The station’s not equipped for civilian guests yet.”
Snapping his head up, the boy was aghast as he found himself looking at a young ensign in a security uniform that had probably been replicated that morning. “You’ll have to return to your ship.”
“Nanisore?” the boy uttered, his jaw hanging open.
The universe was just messing with him at this point.
Glancing back, Nolan saw the retreating back of the Irish officer that had stopped him literally seconds before. Gesturing behind him, the boy glared up as he blurt out, “You had to have just heard that entire conversation!”
“Just doing my job, sir,” the blue-haired ensign remarked flatly.
The boy just blinked. HIs hands shot up into his hair, tugging at it as he blurt out, “Who does the security here? The TSA!?”
In the latter part of the Twenty-Fourth Century, the Federation Transport and Shipping Authority was notorious for poor management and policies that provided more security theater than actual protective safeguards.
